


Such Barters Are Paid For

by amyfortuna



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Fate & Destiny, Halls of Mandos, Mortality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-29
Updated: 2015-10-29
Packaged: 2018-04-28 19:15:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5102546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amyfortuna/pseuds/amyfortuna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nimloth learns firsthand the anguish that cannot be guessed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Such Barters Are Paid For

**Author's Note:**

  * For [havisham](https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/gifts).



> _'For one year, one day, of the flame I would have given all: kin, youth, and hope itself: adaneth I am,' said Andreth._
> 
> _'That he knew,' said Finrod; 'and he withdrew and did not grasp what lay to his hand: elda he is. For such barters are paid for in anguish that cannot be guessed, until it comes, and in ignorance rather than in courage the Eldar judge that they are made.'_
> 
> \----
> 
> _'Andreth adaneth, the life and love of the Eldar dwells much in memory; and we (if not ye) would rather have a memory that is fair but unfinished than one that goes on to a grievous end. Now he will ever remember thee in the sun of morning, and that last evening by the water of Aeluin in which he saw thy face mirrored with a star caught in thy hair - ever, until the North-wind brings the night of his flame. Yea, and after that, sitting in the House of Mandos in the Halls of Awaiting until the end of Arda.'_
> 
> \- both quotes from Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth

Nimloth was the first to die of the royal family, covering Elwing's escape, cornered by Maglor's and Caranthir's people. She stabbed ferociously, angrily, at Caranthir himself even as a sword sliced down across her back, severing her spine. After, she wondered if it was Maglor himself, efficient, graceful, brutal, who had cut her down. She never dared to ask anyone. 

She lived just long enough to see the look of surprise on Caranthir's face as her blade pierced his heart. And then it was as if she was whisked away, her spirit howling in anguish as she soared far from her body. 

She awakened in the Halls. Grey and pale they were in all ways, and those who walked there moved for the most part in silence. She looked down and discovered she was wearing grey robes, hardly more substantial than the mist, like all the others. She could feel the faint echo of pain still resounding all through her, and it felt loud and bright in the silence that otherwise surrounded her. 

And into that silence Dior came like a storm, swirling the grey mists as he appeared beside her, what seemed only moments after she herself arrived. 

"Curufin!" he spat as his first word, as though he were still fighting, turned away from her, not able to see her yet. And then he turned, and his face faded from anger to grief all at once. "Nimloth! Oh, beloved!" A sob caught in his throat, and she stared, wordless. Even in death, all grey and pale, with dark stains seeping through the grey robes he wore, he was still achingly beautiful. 

"Dior," she breathed, after what seemed like days of silence, and held out her arms. He moved into them, and they could feel each other for a moment, slightly more solid than all else. They clung together as though they could never let go. 

A tall shape, even more grey and mysterious than the rest of the Halls, came toward them, cloaked and hooded: Námo, ruler of these Halls. Dior and Nimloth moved apart, keeping their hands clasped, looking nervously at each other. Námo stood before them, regarding them and their clasped hands calmly, for a long time, before he spoke. 

"You do not know your doom, Dior son of Beren," he said at last. "You are mortal and belong to the Race of Men, and must go hence from these Halls soon. You cannot linger long."

Dior gasped, and looked at Nimloth with anguish in his eyes. "No," Nimloth said, and looked up at Námo. "No, you cannot do this, you cannot separate us." 

"It is not my doing," Námo said, and in his voice there was no cruelty, but no mercy either. "Dior was born to mortal parents, has lived a mortal life, and must die a mortal's death. Only One can change the fate of Elves and Men, and I am not that One. Your fate is set. To some a choice will be granted -" he broke off as the grey mists swirled again, and Nimloth saw the small faces of two of the three ones that above all else she was hoping not to see: Eluréd and Elurin, small and full of fear, clinging to each other. 

"Oh my sons," she breathed, even as Dior let out a sharp wordless cry of anger and pain mingled, and dropped her hand to kneel down and fling his arms around them. Nimloth followed, and the two boys were wrapped in their parents' embrace for a long moment. 

Nimloth found that she was weeping, great sobbing tears of anguish spilling over her face. Dior was white-lipped and his eyes were full of desperation as he looked up again at Námo, one arm around each of his sons. 

"Please, do not send me hence from my family, do not separate us forever." His voice was broken and quavering, and when he had spoken he hid his face against Eluréd's shoulder, shaking with sobs. 

Námo's voice was still calm, patient like one speaks to a child, and indeed he did so now, addressing himself to the young boys. "Eluréd, Elurin, you have the right to choose which fate shall be yours. For of your fate I have been told only that you may choose: will you accompany your father as he meets the fate of the Race of Men, or will you choose your mother's fate, the fate of the Eldar?"

Elurin spoke after a moment, his small voice very clear in the mist. "Ada, I will go with you," he said, laying his head against Dior's shoulder.

Eluréd, always the more prudent and careful of the two, took a moment more, hesitating, glancing between father, mother, and brother, as if unsure. Finally he said, looking sadly at Nimloth, "I will go with my brother and my father." And then tears spilled down his face and he reached out for Nimloth, who gathered him close. "I am sorry that I cannot stay with you." 

"Your choice is your own," Nimloth said, trying to keep her face calm although her heart was breaking and breaking within her. She drew Elurin against her as well, clinging to both her sons. Dior looked at her, and their eyes met and held each other for a long time, trying to speak of all the things they thought they would have had all the years of the world to say. 

"Elwing," Dior said at last. "She holds the only hope this family has left." 

"She also holds the Silmaril," Nimloth said. "At the last I sent it with her instead of holding on to it myself. If she lives, the Feanorians do not have it." 

Dior's face went grim at the mention of their murderers, and the mists around them wavered. 

"Your time is nearly done," Námo said, and Dior reached out for Nimloth, letting the grimness fade from his face in favour of embracing her one last time. They knelt in the grey mist, their sons clinging to them, and Dior kissed her, very soft and gentle, almost shy, like he had the first time they had kissed, in a happy dream that felt like it was an eternity ago. The kiss lingered sweetly, an eternity of longing and grief pouring into it, all the lost years, all the wasted dreams and hopes. Nimloth could taste the salt of their mingled tears as their lips parted at last. 

"You do not need me to tell you to watch over our daughter, if you are able to," Dior said, slowly getting to his feet, taking the hands of the boys in his own. They were weeping, looking at her, and she remained on her knees, giving them one final brave look. 

"I will always watch over her," Nimloth said, and raised her eyes to meet Dior's, one final time. Their eyes met, mute resignation and despair on both their faces. "I will always love you." 

"And I will love you, beyond the breaking and remaking of the world," Dior said, voice trembling. "If there is any light at the end of this dark path we both shall walk, may it be that we shall meet again." 

Tears trailed down his face, and it seemed to Nimloth that they were made of light itself. He was fading, they were fading. A breath of wind seemed to blow through the mist, and without further sound or word, he was gone, they were gone. 

Nimloth buried her face in her hands and cried, there on her knees in the cold mist, for a long time. Námo stood by, and said no word, but watched as she wept, face impassive. At length he raised his head and a silent call seemed to sweep through all the mist, one that could not be resisted but must be obeyed. 

A tall shade came forth from the grey fog, eyes burning sharp in the dim light, and stopped before Námo. "Wherefore have you called me, Lord?" he said, shaking his shining head with its bright golden hair. "I am of the same mind; I shall never depart these Halls." 

Nimloth looked up, shaken from her grief. "Why, cousin!" she said, for they were distant relatives. "Aegnor!" 

Aegnor put out a hand and she took it. He raised her to her feet, gently, and then pulled her close. He, too, was slightly more solid than the rest of the mist, and it was a comfort to embrace someone. Námo looked at them, inclining his head in such a manner that on an Elf would have been a nod, then turned and drifted away without another word. 

"Will these Halls, I wonder," Aegnor said, "slowly fill with those who have lost their hearts to mortals?" His tone was sardonic, almost self-deprecating, and Nimloth laughed despite herself, a hollow and a broken laugh, but a laugh nevertheless. He drew back and took her hand. "Come with me."

She followed in silence as he led her down a long winding path, grey mists hiding the details of the place. From time to time she passed other shades like herself, and once, to her horror, thought she caught a glimpse of Caranthir, moving away from the crowds, face grim, grey robes blood-drenched from where she had pierced his breast with her dagger. 

At last, they came to a long wall. Flames flickered in their lanterns nearby, but the mist was lighter here, and the wall seemed to shine of its own light. 

"It is the work of Vairë and her handmaidens, including the famous Broideress," Aegnor said, looking at the wall. Slowly Nimloth began to perceive that it was more than a wall, it was art - a tapestry so vivid that the figures upon it seemed to move. A depiction of the battle of Doriath was appearing on the tapestry as she watched, and Dior's bright sword flashed as he battled with Curufin and Celegorm both at once. 

She laid a hand on the small bright form of her husband, feeling the tears welling up again. 

"He has gone whither I cannot follow," she said softly, "and this is but memory." 

Aegnor's eyes seemed to hold their own tears. "Memory is all that is left to us now. We've bartered our fates for love, and lost."

"A daughter yet remains to me," Nimloth said. The tapestry seemed to shift at her words and she saw Elwing's face, her wide eyes reflecting the light of the Silmaril as she held it up. Nimloth turned to Aegnor. "Come with me, cousin, come out of these Halls. We grieve and we are forsaken, it is true, but here there is nothing but waiting. Sharp-flame, do not tell me you are content to wait until the end of days? Do you not have others who love you, who would gladly meet you in life? Would your mortal beloved be content to see you so?" 

Aegnor laughed, and the laughter was almost like a cry of choked despair. "Andreth would not be pleased, no. Ingoldo said to me once that she would have given all to be with me, no matter how short the days." Tears shone in his eyes, threatening to fall. "You acted in ignorance of your fate and loved without reserve, whereas all I did was draw back in fear, ignorant in another way. And, oh, I have paid for my hard bargain, how I have paid! Anguish without measure has been my lot, and I am weary of it, as weary as Míriel Þerindë ever was." He brought a hand up, covering his face, and Nimloth stepped away from the tapestry and her daughter's face, laying her hand on his shoulder. 

"You have had naught to do in here but brood," she said. "I would guess you have refused to speak with your brothers, who might have talked some sense into you." 

Aegnor shook his head. "I loved my brothers, but one was too much philosophy and little practicality, and the other was all practicality and no philosophy. If they could not change me in life, they would certainly not do so in death." 

Nimloth looked back at the tapestry; the face of her daughter had faded and what appeared now was a mortal woman with tanned skin and dark hair, a bright smile on her face as she knelt on a stone pier beside a lake in the early evening, fingers trailing in the water. A star, reflected in the lake, seemed to be caught in her hair, glimmering through the dark strands which streamed out in the breeze. Her garments were rough and warm, and she was very young, even by mortal standards, perhaps in her late teens or early twenties. 

"Your Andreth?" Nimloth said, and Aegnor's sad smile was answer enough. They both looked at her pictured face for a time, and at last Aegnor sighed. 

"I will come with you." He did not sound happy about it. "On one side, you have a grievous end to a love well begun between Elf and mortal, and on the other a love that remained unfinished however fair it was. And I am persuaded by your example - I erred. I do not wish to compound my error by spending all the days of life on Arda here in these cold Halls. So I will do as Andreth would have wished, and venture out once more."

\-----

They both winced at the light and the noise; after the cold mists of the Halls the Sun was far too bright, the grass too green, the sound of the birds in the trees too loud. Nimloth and Aegnor emerged into a garden, and Nimloth looked up to see an Elf awaiting them, silver-haired like her uncle, wearing a long flowing dress and pearls at her throat. Aegnor's gasp was eloquent. 

"Mother," he said. 

"You have been away long, my son," Eärwen said warmly. "Indeed from the way Ingoldo tells it, you would never leave." She reached out and pulled him into her embrace, laughing, for she was much shorter than he was, and he clung to her, the tension that was on his face easing. 

Nimloth smiled at the sight, but then her attention was caught by wary movement in the trees behind Eärwen. A delicate bird-like face peered out from behind a tree, dark hair flowing down across her back. And Nimloth knew her as instantly as if no years had passed. 

"Elwing?" she said, her heart in her mouth. The figure stepped out from behind the tree, approaching her with light, careful steps. Elwing bore the look of one who had been through much suffering. "My little Elwing." A smile dawned over Elwing's face and in the next moment, she was in Nimloth's arms, and Nimloth was smiling as though her heart had been broken and mended again, smiling like the sun had come out from behind the clouds into glorious day once more.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Such Barters Are Paid For by amyfortuna](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5408627) by [pumpkinpodfic (thegreatpumpkin)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegreatpumpkin/pseuds/pumpkinpodfic)




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